Burning Art at Flipside 2008
Burning Flipside has established a set of guidelines for burnable art during the event. The spirit of these guidelines is to encourage artists to create burnable art, but also to consider health, safety, and clean-up issues.
The short list, if you are going to burn art:
Check the unsafe materials list, and ensure nothing toxic is burned.
Make sure you have a backup plan to take all of your art home, in case you are not allowed to burn it.
Safety
We will have fire safety crew on hand for all scheduled burns. We need everyone's help to burn safely and to make clean up is as easy as possible. No one appreciates sweating on Monday in the hot Texas sun cleaning up someone else's moop!
Flipside is located in the Texas Hill Country, which gets very dry. Any fire larger than a burn barrel requires a permit and fire safety measures. We have a fire safety crew on hand for any large burns. There is no guarantee we will be able to burn anything, including the effigy. Our fire safety team will determine the feasibility of burning the effigy and art installations the day of the scheduled burn. If anyone of authority tells you not to burn something, please do not burn it. This is for everyone’s safety.
If you want to burn small to medium sized art, you may do so right after the effigy is burned in the main fire pit on Sunday night, while the fire crew is still present. Nothing will be allowed into the fire later than 30 minutes after the effigy burn so that it can safely burn out and cool down by the next morning. The fire safety crew will enforce this policy. If you throw anything into the fire, please help clean up the effigy area! If you would like to burn something at a location other than the effigy burn pit, you must make arrangements for this prior to the event. Contact Sparky, this year’s safety coordinator at safety08@burningflipside.com.
Clean-up
You will be responsible for cleaning up your burn scar. This includes but is not limited to nails, bolts, screws, wire, staples, bone, etc. It will be too hot to clean up right after you burn your project, so you must plan to return later and remove the burn scar. A shovel and 5-gallon buckets or metal barrels with lids work well. Bring a magnetic rake to clean up your metal remnants. If you burn art in the effigy pit, it is your responsibility to assist the clean up crew on Monday. Please respect the team and your community by cleaning up a proportionate amount of ashes and materials. Please contact your Earth Guardian lead to review your clean up plan prior to the event.
In the event of a burn ban, you must have a plan to transport your art back home.
Safe Materials
Basically, most organic material is OK.
Unsafe Materials
It is recommended that anyone bringing materials to be burned first refer to the excellent information at the burningman.com website.
Simply put, synthetic materials are not allowed, nor are mattresses or furniture.
Burning Flipside encourages you to avoid the following materials: